


Give Me Your Answer

by chewsdaychillin



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Cheek Kisses, F/F, Forehead Kisses, Haircuts, Hurt/Comfort, Post-coffin, brief discussion of gendered language, buzzcut season baby, coming back and dealing with it all, ish ? theyre fine just awkward and trying to feel better
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:47:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25149442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chewsdaychillin/pseuds/chewsdaychillin
Summary: ‘You hate it.’ Basira says flatly, not needing to ask after weeks of this. Daisy hums. ‘Why don’t you do something about it?’
Relationships: Basira Hussain/Alice "Daisy" Tonner
Comments: 11
Kudos: 57





	Give Me Your Answer

**Author's Note:**

> we give daisy a buzzcut and briefly work through gendered language re. compliments ie. handsome vs pretty. i dont use any other language related to butch/femme or masculine/feminine identities. i know theres a lot of discourse surrounding daisy as butch and i get why that is. i havent tried to solve it here, just working thru some gender ideas. 
> 
> also they joke around the idea of sex but its all implied there is no explicit or even particularly suggestive language 
> 
> brief references to daisys physio (off screen) 
> 
> i havent written these two before so hopefully u enjoy !

They are sat on the floor, which is actually better than the old sofa at this point. Not that the lino is great - it’s a little sticky actually, since anyone who would have cleaned it is lonely or angry or dreaming or dead, and Basira really can’t be arsed with it. But the sofa has springs sticking out at all awful angles. Desperately needs replacing but, on top of everyone’s own issues, there’s the issue that their old boss is in prison and their new boss is... never around.

Daisy deserves better than that shitty sofa and this shitty break room floor. She needs rest, she needs more of the physio she’s just come from and a health plan of some sort. She probably needs to hunt, which Basira does know is hypocritical to think. Doesn’t stop her thinking it. But so far she’s done little more than think, little to actually give Daisy what she deserves.

Daisy seems to think what she deserves is atonement. More penance is in order, and then probably more thinking and a break and losing more of her muscle. All the fight has gone out of her, the thirst that was a bit too much. With it too has gone all her drive and fire and passion and any semblance of energy.

She sags against the wall now. Slunk on the floor because leaning against it was too much effort. Basira sits next to her because there is nowhere else to be until there is a lead to shoehorn into a plan. And it’s her place. It’s where she sits. Next to Daisy. It’s where she wants to be. It is.

It feels weird though.

They sit in silence, only the weak crunch of Daisy’s too-soft toast. (No one knows who left the margarine in the fridge but Jon had looked at it with pitiful Bambi eyes so Basira can take a decent punt.) It would have been companionable silence in their old flat. Well, it’s the same flat. Back when it had been theirs, before Daisy had... moved out. Since Daisy moved back in it’s been much of the same of this weird just-less-than-companionable silence.

Is the silence good for her? It can’t be, Basira thinks. Doing things used to be what was good for her, get her out of a funk like this one where she eats too much toast. But Daisy hasn’t appreciated her pointing that out so far.

The space in their bed seems much more cramped now with two people, but the gap between Daisy’s side and Basira’s side is a chasm compared to what it was before Yarmouth.

Daisy finishes the last crust and sighs, frowns, pulls a hair out of her mouth. Her hair gets everywhere now.

‘Drink?’ Basira asks her, for want of anything else. ‘Tea?’ Because it’s what Martin used to ask Jon for want of any practical solution to offer a moping monster.

Daisy shakes her head. If she is anything less than content with the silence she doesn’t seem to have the energy right now. The physio takes it out of her, in her defence, but it’s irritating. The emptiness. It’s so unproductive and there’s nothing to be done to fix it. And the tap is dripping.

Basira is about to suggest they just go home, since clocking out isn’t really a thing anymore and five PM is a construct anyway.

Then she hears an ice cream van driving somewhere in the distance. It is playing their favourite of the canon of jingles - less obnoxious than _Match Of The Day_ , less English than _Greensleeves_ , and less creepy than _The Teddy Bear Picnic:_

_  
Daisy, Daisy,_  
_Give me your answer, do. I’m half crazy_  
_Over the love of you_

  
The music-box sound peters out as it rounds a corner and drives out of earshot. But they both know the rest of it and the words it’s not singing.

There’s a little look and half a quiet breath of laughter between them, the first fond one since Daisy’s been out. Then Daisy sighs again, this time clearly contented, and puts her hand out. It rests above Basira’s knee, palm heavy and tired. Warm. Getting crumbs on her jeans.

Basira leans into her shoulder, shimmies up so her cheek rests across Daisy’s shoulder, the top of her head safe under Daisy’s jaw. Holding it up. Daisy shuffles a bit too, helping them get comfortable. It isn’t that comfortable; the floor is still hard, the angle is still a bit awkward. Will crick both their necks probably.

But it isn’t weird.

Daisy tuts and shucks her hair back behind her ear, wipes it round to the other side of her head so it isn’t pressed against her cheek or Basira’s forehead.

‘You hate it.’ Basira says flatly, not needing to ask after weeks of this. Daisy hums. ‘Why don’t you do something about it?’

‘Not sure what I want. Can’t stand hairdressers.’

(Basira knows this about her - the water’s always too hot or too cold, the porcelain digs into her neck, water gets under her collar, and they talk too much.)

‘I’ll buzz it,’ Basira says decisively.

‘What if I have a weird shaped head?’

‘You had it short before and your head was a normal shape.’

‘You’d still like me if my head was a weird shape?’ Daisy asks. She makes no change to her voice at all but Basira knows she’s teasing.

‘Piss off.’

  
Back home they get all set up in front of the sink. It’s perfect, Basira thinks: she gets to do something decisive and make some progress; Daisy gets to sit down.

Basira is probably a bit too ruthless with the scissors, but really there’s no point in keeping anything past Daisy’s shoulders. She’s never kept it like that. The blades click and clack and hair piles on the bathroom floor and they don’t talk too much. Daisy seems content to let it happen and Basira almost wishes she would have an opinion. She keeps chopping.

Once they reach chin level Daisy puts her hand out, unflinching, to grab and still the scissors. She turns her head slowly, looking at both sides, at the rough spin of the ends when she moves.

‘Hmm,’ she says.

‘What do you think?’ Basira presses her. ‘Shorter.’

It’s not very specific but it is decisive, and quite brave, really. Basira grins and rummages for clippers.

When she’s done a two all over, Daisy’s head isn’t a weird shape but it is fragile looking. The cut is relatively neat but there are a few nicks here and there. Basira brushes off the clippings she can get from Daisy’s neck (there are still plenty clinging to the back of her t-shirt), and, in a fit of casual bravery, drops a quick kiss to the back of her head. It feels bristly and bouncy against her lips.

Daisy hums, and when Basira looks at her in the mirror she sees Daisy’s eyes closed peacefully. Basira goes back to wiping hair.

‘There,’ she announces, straightening up, ‘done.’  
  
Daisy stands and turns her head, runs her hand over it with a soft scraping noise. ‘Huh,’ she says, eyebrows close in a small frown.

‘It looks good,’ Basira tells her. Not really a compliment just stating fact. Daisy ducks her head to examine the top, still frowning. Maybe a little compliment wouldn’t go amiss. ‘Very handsome.’

‘Hmm,’ Daisy considers.

Maybe compliments don’t work the same either anymore, Basira thinks. But then they were comfortable enough before that a little thing like that wouldn’t make them flustered, flushing messes.

‘I’m not sure,’ Daisy says slowly, ‘if that’s what I want to be anymore.’  
  
‘Why?’ Basira frowns.

She doesn’t get these deep questions. Fine, the buried has changed Daisy. But how can months of crushing claustrophobia change how you feel about... compliments? Gender? It’s probably one of those things Daisy’s better off philosophising and moping with Jon about, much as that annoys her. She wants to get it right though, still. Resolving to put an end to it, practically, with a solution, before lights out, Basira leans on the sink and reminds Daisy that -

‘You can still be handsome without all the blood and that. It’s not about ‘tough’, or whatever.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ Daisy sighs, but her face seems to be loosening up the longer she looks at her hair. ‘It’s not that, I don’t think. I don’t know.’

‘Very pretty then.’

Daisy grimaces as she laughs. ‘Oh, that’s worse.’  
  
Basira grins, clicks her tongue. ‘Well whatever,’ she says, and, with that same spirit

of fuck it and a bit of familiar warmth, places a kiss on the side of Daisy’s cheek.

It’s bridging the gap a bit between the loyalty they still have and the partnership of before. They don’t say ‘romance’ because it makes them both pull faces but... yeah. That. Is what it was. A kiss on the cheek doesn’t have to be that. It’s not all the way there yet. Friends do it. Maybe not them but friends. Still, it’s something. Daisy is smiling.

‘You look happier,’ Basira goes on before Daisy can say anything about it.

‘Yeah,’ Daisy agrees, in her lower voice that’s coming out much more now. ‘Shall we go to bed?’

Basira does a triple take, steps away from her and stares at her in the minute. ‘Excuse me?’

Daisy chuckles. ‘To sleep, I mean. Don’t worry, I’m not raring to go after one cheek-kiss.’

‘Not sure if I should be insulted.’  
  
‘Or relieved?’

Basira scoffs, avoids her gaze. (They haven’t yet and it’s going to be different probably when they do. She’s not avoiding it. Not relieved Daisy hasn’t tried it on. Just gotta get there gradually, she supposes.)

‘It’s not-‘ she sighs, cornered and annoyed about it and exasperated and fond. ‘Bed.’

‘Bed,’ Daisy agrees. She stands, offers Basira her tooth brush and kisses her forehead. ‘Thanks.’

‘No worries.’

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! pls leave a comment n tell me what u think i have not written these two much before and this is my first much needed long awaited f/f for tma :))
> 
> you might know already but im currently taking fic commissions as a way to supplement my income doing something i love to do. you can find my post w prices n details [here](https://babyyodablackwood.tumblr.com/tagged/fic-commissions) ! 
> 
> i also now have a kofi! if you arent interested in a commission but u like my writing then pls feel free to chuck me a couple quid [here](https://ko-fi.com/chewsdaychillin) x
> 
> no pressure, just every little helps if you've had fun here xx


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